During and after Tropical Storm Irene passed through the tri-state area, people with disabilities and their advocates reported lack of accessibility at some evacuation centers and insufficient disaster planning for the disability community.
The City ordered evacuations from “Zone A” neighborhoods that are considered the most vulnerable to flooding. Susan Dooha, executive director of the Center for Independence of the Disabled, New York (CIDNY) surveyed six of the shelters for those residents and found problems with accessibility.
CIDNY has been working with the City’s Office of Emergency Management (OEM) on disaster preparedness since 9/11 and Dooha said she was disappointed to find dangerous ramps, inaccessible bathrooms and eating areas, inaccessible transit vehicles that would prevent the evacuation of people with disabilities and inconsistent or lack of signage.
Tania Morales of Brooklyn, who uses a wheelchair, told Dooha that the doors to an accessible ramp at her local evacuation center were locked and she had to return home during the storm. Dooha said she also knows a 9/11 survivor who uses a scooter and could not use her nearby shelter because of a lack of accessible cots.
Marvin Wasserman, executive director of the Brooklyn Center for Independence for the Disabled (BCID) said the services and information on storm preparations were inadequate and pointed out that the City’s PDF evacuation zone map is inaccessible to people with low vision.
“When you look at the broad range of disabilities you quickly realize there is no single reliable source of information that the community can access. For instance, citizens are encouraged to pack am/fm radios in their ‘go bags’ but that won’t help people who are deaf or hard of hearing,” he said.
Wasserman said he was particularly concerned about a lack of sufficient information in Brooklyn, which contains many flood-prone neighborhoods such as Coney Island, Brighton Beach and Red Hook that have a high concentration of people with disabilities.
“With accessible hospitals and nursing homes in the affected area closing, the community is feeling they have nowhere to turn during an evacuation and have not yet been notified of alternative efforts,” Wasserman said.
Matthew Sapolin, commissioner of the Mayor’s Office for People with Disabilities could not respond to the complaints yet, said City press representative Samantha Levine. “We are still evaluating [the] hurricane response and [he] will not be able to speak to that issue at this time,” Levine said by email.
The OEM could not be reached at press time. Before the storm the office released a statement saying, “There is an evacuation plan for the homebound, elderly and disabled. They will be escorted to safe evacuation centers by the city’s caregivers. They are encouraged to call 311 to do so.”
Transportation systems across the region shut down early in anticipation of the storm, making evacuations more difficult. Access-A-Ride trips were scheduled one day in advance for trips on Saturday, August 27, which ended at 6 p.m. Customers were asked to limit their scheduled trips for Monday, August 29 to those of medical necessity.
In New Jersey, the paratransit service Access Link stopped running at 6 p.m. Saturday along with the Hudson-Bergen, Newark and River Line light rail trains and NJ Transit buses.
Suffolk County officials urged residents to register with the Suffolk County Department of Fire Rescue and the Emergency Services Joint Emergency Evacuation Program (JEEP) registry, which provides shelter and transportation assistance for people with disabilities who might need help evacuating their homes in an emergency.
Frank Krotschinsky, director of the Suffolk County Office for People with Disabilities said he hasn’t heard of many problems and believes people received the services they needed during the storm.
Therese Brzezinski, director of advocacy and community policy at the Long Island Center for Independent Living, Inc. asked people with disabilities to report their experiences during the storm to assist in disaster planning for the future. One person contacted the city’s independent living centers to say that media outlets should use adaptive technology to keep people with hearing disabilities informed during an emergency so they do not have to rely on neighbors.
Brzezinski also announced that people who live in federally declared disaster areas may be eligible for temporary suspensions of their student loan payments by calling their loan provider.
This article was published in the October 2011 issue of Able News.
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